The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, has been reported as telling The Times that ‘What you are seeing in the Church schools is a deeper and deeper commitment to the common good. There’s a steady move away from faith-based entry tests… It is not necessary to select to get a really good school. There are unbelievably brilliant schools that are entirely open to all applicants without selection criteria apart from residence, where you live, and which produce staggeringly good results. It’s a question of — and you can point to them all over the place — it’s a question of outstanding leadership.’

However, Lambeth Palace has subsequently rebutted the story, and put out a statement quoting the Archbishop as saying that ‘I fully support the current policy for schools to set their own admissions criteria, including the criterion of faith. Nothing in my wider comments to The Times on this subject should be seen as dissenting from this policy.’

The British Humanist Association (BHA), Accord Coalition for inclusive education and Professor Ted Cantle, and the Richmond Inclusive Schools Campaign (RISC) are on the steering group of the Fair Admissions Campaign.

BHA Chief Executive Andrew Copson commented, ‘Religious selection in admissions segregates pupils on the basis of their parents’ beliefs and on socio-economic and ethnic grounds. Any move to end it must be welcome. Unfortunately, however, this is not the first time in recent years that representatives of the Church have been reported as saying one thing only for this to later be rebutted or not translated into reality. There have been promises, for example, of at least 25% inclusivity in 2006, 90% inclusivity in 2011 and 50% inclusivity in London. Ongoing research by the Fair Admissions Campaign shows that a huge number of Church schools have admissions criteria that are more restrictive than this, frequently allowing for the selection of every single pupil on the basis of faith. If the Church of England now joins the campaign to repeal the laws allowing religious discrimination, of course that will be a significant change – but it appears that will not be the case.’

Rabbi Dr Romain commented, ‘That the Archbishop has spoken about the way Church schools have up to now selected in their admission policies and the need for this to change – implying surely that the current situation is to be regretted – is a step forward, although it is also regrettable that the implications of those comments have largely been overridden. The way religiously selective schools discriminate in their admission policies is highly dubious, both morally and religiously, for not only do they divide children from one another, but a faith school that is based on discrimination has little religious credibility.’

Professor Ted Cantle commented, ‘Justin Welby’s comments in The Times make his views views clear – and he is right to support a move away from faith-based selection. I think his comments show the contradiction between the faith’s ideals and the practice of the Church.’

Jeremy Rodell, spokesperson for RISC said ‘To take the example of the London Borough of Richmond: all eight of the Voluntary Aided Anglican primaries with reception classes have admissions policies involving faith-based selection. In four of them the result is a high level of discrimination against children whose parents are not practising Anglicans. Despite Vince Cable, the MP for Twickenham, urging them to be more “community minded”, and our requests for action to both the London and Southwark Dioceses and directly to all the schools, so far not one has decided to change its policy as far as we know. Yet the Church appoints the majority of the governors.’

Notes

For further comment please contact BHA Head of Public Affairs Pavan Dhaliwal on 07738 435 059 or Accord Coalition Chair Jonathan Romain on 07770 722 893 or email info@fairadmissions.org.uk. For further information please contact Accord Coalition Coordinator Paul Pettinger on 020 7324 3071.

The Fair Admissions Campaign wants all state-funded schools in England and Wales to be open equally to all children, without regard to religion or belief. The Campaign is supported by a wide coalition of individuals and national and local organisations. We hold diverse views on whether or not the state should fund faith schools. But we all believe that faith-based discrimination in access to schools that are funded by the taxpayer is wrong in principle and a cause of religious, ethnic, and socio-economic segregation, all of which are harmful to community cohesion. It is time it stopped.

Supporters of the campaign include the Accord Coalition, the British Humanist Association, Professor Ted Cantle and the iCoCo Foundation, the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, British Muslims for Secular Democracy, the Campaign for State Education, the Centre for Studies on Inclusive Education, the Christian think tank Ekklesia, the Hindu Academy, the Green Party, the Liberal Democrat Education Association, Liberal Youth, the Local Schools Network, Richmond Inclusive Schools Campaign, the Runnymede Trust, the Socialist Educational Association, and the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches.

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The question, ‘Should Labour care about selective faith schools?’ received an overwhelming yes yesterday evening, as Labour Humanists held a Fair Admissions Campaign-themed event in central London that was standing room only. The event, chaired by Labour Humanists chair Naomi Phillips, featured contributions from London Assembly Member Tom Copley, British Humanist Association Chief Executive Andrew Copson, Fabian Society General Secretary Andrew Harrop, and author and columnist Joan Smith. Separately Tom Copley and Labour Humanists have made a joint submission to the Labour Party’s Your Britain website, where party members can vote in support of fair admissions.

Labour Humanists and the BHA are among many supporting groups of the Fair Admissions Campaign, with support also coming from religious groups and individuals such as Ekklesia, British Muslims for Secular Democracy, the Hindu Academy, the Unitarians and Accord Coalition Chair Rabbi Dr Jonathan Romain, and from political groups such as the Green Party, Liberal Democrat Education Association, Liberal Youth, and Socialist Educational Association.

Speaking first, Andrew Copson gave an overview of recent research published by the Campaign on the extent to which religiously selective admissions policies contribute to segregation. Mr Copson cited statistics showing that faith-based selection causes socio-economic and ethnic segregation, referring to measures such as eligibility for Free School Meals, English as an additional language and ethnicity. He deplored the policies employed by schools such as the London Oratory School, a state funded Catholic secondary which selects on the basis of parents doing flower arranging, and Twyford CofE High School, also state funded and yet prioritising parents on the basis of ‘Assisting with collection/counting money’, ‘Tea & coffee Rota’, ‘Church maintenance’ and ‘Parish Magazine Editor’. Copson cited huge public support for a change in the law.

Joan Smith spoke more widely about her concerns about state funded faith schools – concerns which were largely outside of the scope of the Fair Admissions Campaign, but highlighted how in her view such issues are compounded by faith-based admissions policies.

Andrew Harrop movingly described how his daughter started primary school this term, but didn’t get into their first choice of school: she had been at a Catholic nursery for the past two years, but was ‘expelled’ because the school’s admissions policy prioritises Catholics (which he and his wife are not) over other Christians, those of other religions, and lastly those of no religion. His daughter was very upset about this and didn’t understand, and instead has ended up at a good but more socio-economically disadvantaged school – which he didn’t believe would be a problem for her but would affect other children’s prospects more drastically. Harrop emphasised he is a supporter of the state funding of faith schools, citing the Churches’ historical role in providing education. But he stated his opposition to discrimination in admissions, and asked the Churches whether they are comfortable presiding over ‘a fraudulent and deceptive system’ that people game. He implored Labour to decide to act on the issue soon.

Tom Copley pointed out that the segregation is based on the faith of parents, not the faith of the children who may decide they are of another religion or belief. He pointed out that there is no segregation of trains or hospitals on a similar basis, and described the problem as a ‘huge equality issue’ with people not being able to access local schools. Mr Copley particularly thought it perverse that faith schools often prioritise those of other religions over those of no religion: ‘better you believe in the wrong God than no God at all.’ Tom fears that ethnic segregation in schools is getting worse, highlighting research that education children together produces greater understanding.

Notes

For further comment please contact BHA Head of Public Affairs Pavan Dhaliwal on 07738 435 059 or email info@fairadmissions.org.uk.

Read Labour Humanists’ Storify of the event: http://storify.com/labourhumanists/selective-faith-schools-should-labour-care

If you’re a Labour Party member you can vote in support of fair admissions becoming Labour policy at http://www.yourbritain.org.uk/agenda-2015/policy-commissions/education-and-children-policy-commission/faith-schools-admissions

The Fair Admissions Campaign wants all state-funded schools in England and Wales to be open equally to all children, without regard to religion or belief. The Campaign is supported by a wide coalition of individuals and national and local organisations. We hold diverse views on whether or not the state should fund faith schools. But we all believe that faith-based discrimination in access to schools that are funded by the taxpayer is wrong in principle and a cause of religious, ethnic, and socio-economic segregation, all of which are harmful to community cohesion. It is time it stopped.

Supporters of the campaign include the Accord Coalition, the British Humanist Association, Professor Ted Cantle and the iCoCo Foundation, the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, British Muslims for Secular Democracy, the Campaign for State Education, the Centre for Studies on Inclusive Education, the Christian think tank Ekklesia, the Hindu Academy, the Green Party, the Liberal Democrat Education Association, Liberal Youth, the Local Schools Network, Richmond Inclusive Schools Campaign, the Runnymede Trust, the Socialist Educational Association, and the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches.

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The Fair Admissions Campaign is today revealing some of the most unrepresentative schools in the country on the basis of the proportion of intake that speaks English as an additional language – including one school, Twyford Church of England High School, that gives priority in its admissions to pupils whose parents participate in ‘voluntary service’ such as ‘Bell ringing’, ‘Flower arranging at church’, ‘Assisting with collection/counting money’, ‘Tea & coffee Rota’, ‘Church cleaning’ and ‘Church maintenance’.

In 2011, Michael Gove visited the school where he called it ‘a superb state school which draws children from every social background and gives them all a rigorous academic education’. Then in July, Mr Gove gave a speech to the Church of England in which he praised the head for the inclusive approach to the issue of school admissions at a new Free School which she was involved in setting up. But Twyford itself is in fact extremely selective. The school allocates 150 of its 180 places to Christians, awarding them points for meeting the aforementioned criteria, along with others such as ‘Parish Magazine Editor’ and ‘Technical support’. Similarly, children are awarded points for taking part in ‘Choir / Music Group’s associated with the Church, and for ‘Church based outreach’. The remaining 30 places are allocated to parents and children of other faiths who take part in similar activities, such as ‘Cleaning place of worship’, ‘Serving refreshments at place of worship’ and ‘Preparing food at place of worship’.

At Twyford 10% of pupils are eligible for Free School Meals, compared with 24% of the public living in its local area (known as a middle super output area), 26% across pupils at schools sharing the same first half of post code and 27% across its borough. 10% of pupils speak English as an additional language (EAL), compared to 20% of the public in its MSOA, 39% of pupils across the post code, 50% across the borough and 47% across all neighbouring boroughs.

This makes the school the ninth most unrepresentative school in the country, based on comparing the number of pupils speaking EAL to their local areas. The most unrepresentative school is The King David High School in Manchester, a Jewish school which has admissions criteria to select 100% of pupils on religious grounds. 26% of local pupils speak EAL, compared to 1% in the school.

The second worst is The King’s (the Cathedral) School in Peterborough, a Church of England school which has admissions criteria to select 89% of pupils on the basis of faith. It requires five years of worship but doesn’t objectively set out how this is assessed – a potential breach of the Admissions Code. The school also selects 12 places on general academic ability, despite not being a grammar school. 31% of local pupils speak EAL, compared to 7% in the school.

The fifth worst is the JFS, which has admissions criteria to be 100% selective, and is the Jewish school that had a famous court battle over its religious admissions criteria in 2009, as a result of which it was found to be discriminated on grounds of race. It gives priority to those attending Jewish primaries without naming them and to those doing Jewish charitable work, both likely breaches of the School Admissions Code. 22% of local pupils speak EAL, compared to 9% in the school.

The eighth worst is Finchley Catholic High School, which has admissions criteria to be 100% selective, Catholic school in Barnet. It gets both parents to fill in a very subjective self-assessment form for the priest, who then decides whether this is adequate to provide a reference to the school with no objective criteria for this coming into play – likely to be a breach of the School Admissions Code. 17% of local pupils speak EAL, compared to 7% in the school.

In total, 24 of the worst 100 secondary schools, or 27 of the worst 100 non-grammar schools, are religiously selective – compared to just 16% of all secondaries.

Rabbi Dr Jonathan Romain MBE, Chair of the Accord Coalition, commented, ‘How sad that faith schools – once a beacon of hope for the poor and vulnerable – are often so socially and economically selective that they have become the bastion of the privileged. It is not just an educational mismatch but a religious failure too. Most Church schools were set up to provide education for the poorest, so skimming off many of those children with the sharpest elbowed and most affluent parents in a local community is in conflict with the original mission of the Church’s involvement in school age education. It is time that Twyford High School took inspiration from those faith schools that are choosing to turn away from religiously discriminatory admissions and became a beacon of inclusivity, rather than privilege.’

Professor Ted Cantle, founder of the Institute of Community Cohesion and author of the Cantle Report into the 2001 race riots, commented, ‘Religious selection directly contributes to ethnic segregation – a problem which both local and national studies have shown to be growing over the last 10 years. The advent of academies, responsible for their own admissions, and the new free schools, are accelerating segregation and failing to provide our children with the opportunity to dispel the fear and prejudice which it breeds.’

The British Humanist Association, a founding member of the Fair Admissions Campaign, recently won a case at the Schools Adjudicator about the London Oratory School, because the school similarly selects on the basis of parents’ flower arranging. The school removed cleaning from its admissions arrangements after the Office of the Schools Adjudicator ruled last year that this breached the school admissions code.  BHA Head of Public Affairs Pavan Dhaliwal commented, ‘Any right minded person would deplore these schools and the egregious system which allows for it to select pupils on the basis of their parents’ flower arranging, collecting money from the pews, maintaining or cleaning the church or serving tea and coffee. Such blatant discrimination within the faith schools regime allows them to socio-economically determine their intake. The vast majority of the public do not think it is right for a child to be turned away from their local school, or the best school in their area, because they are of no religion or of the wrong religion. The Secretary of State should be challenging, not endorsing, such a socially divisive system.’

The Richmond Inclusive Schools Campaign recently fought against the establishment of a highly exclusive Catholic secondary school. Their spokesperson, Jeremy Rodell, said ‘We have local examples of community primary schools with more than five times the proportion of pupils eligible for free school meals compared to church schools just a short distance away. We also have a new Church of England primary with no faith-based selection at all. State-funded church schools can choose whether they want to serve the whole community, or turn local children away simply because of their parents’ religious practices.’

Notes

For further comment please contact BHA Head of Public Affairs Pavan Dhaliwal on 07738 435 059 or Accord Coalition Chair Jonathan Romain on 07770 722 893 or email info@fairadmissions.org.uk.

Read Twyford School’s admissions policy: http://www.twyford.ealing.sch.uk/admissions/admissions.html

The Church of England’s London Diocesan Board for Schools recently told the Campaign that its ‘…policy is to encourage our Church of England Schools to have half open places and half foundation places. For the new schools we are promoting we are going for all open places’.

Visit the Fair Admissions Campaign’s website: https://fairadmissions.org.uk/

The Fair Admissions Campaign wants all state-funded schools in England and Wales to be open equally to all children, without regard to religion or belief. The Campaign is supported by a wide coalition of individuals and national and local organisations. We hold diverse views on whether or not the state should fund faith schools. But we all believe that faith-based discrimination in access to schools that are funded by the taxpayer is wrong in principle and a cause of religious, ethnic, and socio-economic segregation, all of which are harmful to community cohesion. It is time it stopped.

Supporters of the campaign include the Accord Coalition, the British Humanist Association, Professor Ted Cantle and the iCoCo Foundation, the Association of Teachers and Lecturers, British Muslims for Secular Democracy, the Campaign for State Education, the Centre for Studies on Inclusive Education, the Christian think tank Ekklesia, the Hindu Academy, the Green Party, the Liberal Democrat Education Association, Liberal Youth, the Local Schools Network, Richmond Inclusive Schools Campaign, the Runnymede Trust, the Socialist Educational Association, and the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches.

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Below, one (agnostic) parent anonymously shares her journal entry after her daughter’s first day at primary school – outlining their situation after failing to get her admitted to a nearby school (including the Church school next door) due to religious discrimination:

Yesterday my partner towed our daughter in the bike trailer to her school. I cycled alongside – against the flow of pupils headed for the local school by car and by foot. It was a tough slog up the hill. I will not be able to tow a trailer up that hill. So on the days when I take her, we will walk.

The shortest route is not a pleasant walk, nor to cycle, as it follows main roads. There are no bus links and it’s headed out of town; the wrong direction for work.

Mid-morning the Head of the school next door to our house phoned. There’d been an error, she said, our daughter was not first on the waiting list in July; the council has got it wrong. We were second, or used to be. Because then a latecomer joined the list with a religious reference so actually we were 3rd. Or used to be. Because now there’d been some churn and the two kids, who we didn’t know were in front, had got places. So now our daughter IS actually first on the waiting list. And this is good, the head said, because at 0.07miles from the school she is the closest of all the children who are close!
Are you following? No, neither did we.

I think she was saying that it is positive that our daughter is top of this list of children who won’t get a place. No one can get in ahead of us on proximity! Which, yes, could be good, if the school did not consider proximity to be almost irrelevant in deciding who would be admitted.

In any case, she was about to ring someone to offer a place, but thought she’d ring us first in case we heard about it and wondered why it wasn’t us. I said, not to worry, it was unlikely we would have heard anything as this family is probably not local. (ouchy!)

She then asked what school our daughter is at, if she has started and were we still be interested in changing even once she is settled. I explained the distance, that there are no buses, we don’t have a car and there are 3 closer schools, so yes we’d change. We’d settle even for the third closest as we could share school runs with the neighbours.

She immediately named the neighbours’ kids I meant. I was impressed. She may even know all the names of the local kids her school rejects. I thought this must be something to do with calling themselves a ‘community’ school.  And even though I didn’t say this… she went on to talk about the community school label, to say that she doesn’t agree with the religious selection policy, that it’s distorted in recent years so that few children in the community get in. She hopes it will change soon. In fact she thinks it WILL change soon (note to self…she has said this before in previous years… don’t get excited) but waiingt lists will still be assessed according the rules of the year of the original application, so actually no difference for us (see? Do not get excited).

I told her that I didn’t understand the purpose of selection; I know people from another faith who get places. She took pride in this – ‘yes we are a multi faith, multicultural school, as we should be’.

‘And you rank all these faiths in order of importance!’ – No, I bit my tongue just in time.

Here are the rankings:

Parish C of E, then out of parish C of E, then RC, Methodist, Baptist, Presbyterian, Mormon and other Christian faiths; then Islamic, Hindu, Sikh, Jewish, Jehovah’s witness and other faiths. Agnostics and atheists.

Agnostics and atheists rank equally last, but, if you were to ask me to get into the spirit of these selection criteria, agnostics should have the edge. At least we haven’t entirely rejected all faiths.

I, like many baptised, confirmed and then lapsed Irish people, am agnostic. I think it’s hard for people like me to become a proper atheist.

My partner is an atheist. He attended a Church of England primary.

Our daughter has actually recently become a big fan of Jesus. She found Him on a hill in South America and we haven’t held her back. It will be her choice. However we haven’t signed her up to a church, because we are not members of a church. Some might say, if we were so keen she goes to the school next door, that we should play the game. I think that would a terrible introduction to a faith for her. Lesson 1: the art of discrimination. Lesson 2: hypocrisy.

To challenge it, I need to understand the spirit of the selection. I can understand a C of E school wanting to serve its parish, and would not consider it particularly unfair if they selected 10% from the local church; in line with their funding. But what’s the deal with prioritising any faith over those without a faith? Is this about uniting against the godless? Then. if that were the case, why prioritise C of E outside the parish over Roman Catholics and RC over Hindus or Jews?

Could it just be simply Ofsted rating chasing; they think that parents who make the effort to go to church are more likely to take an interest in their child’s education?

I attempted school pick up yesterday. I cycled up to the school with her scooter on my back rack, but coming back was a struggle. My four year old was exhausted and just whined. The pavement is too narrow to walk side by side, the surface too potholed for her scooter and there’s a lot of traffic. Halfway back she refused to go any farther and I called her dad to come pick us up with the trailer.

This on a fine dry day – what will it be like midwinter? Her father won’t be able to do this every day. We’re not in the worst situation. She has a school place when many don’t. Some kids have to travel even further. So I am not complaining, but I am angry and I don’t know where to direct this anger.

If it’s not the head.

And it’s not the Church of England (the Bishop of Oxford has come out strongly against selection).

It could be the governors.

It could be the local Diocese.

It could be the council and Government, which provide almost all of their funding yet allow 100% selection on religious grounds.

It could be all of them and none. I think they all bear some responsibility. While all of them, bar perhaps the governors, profess that they, they personally, don’t like the situation either, not one of them feels tasked to change it.

From my garden I can see the playground next door and hear the kids on their break. My ideal is that my daughter will be able one day to walk alone to primary school, not be trekked along main roads to the next neighbourhood. None of the parents who park their cars outside our house want that, neither for my child nor their own.

This morning we saw our neighbour walk his children the opposite direction to the third closest school. They are part of the local diaspora; the children allocated out to other areas. If even anyone else near us was going to our daughter’s school it would help; she’d walk more easily in the company of other children – though the pavement’s widths and the busy roads would still be a problem.

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The Accord Coalition and Labour Teachers co-hosted a fringe meeting at the Labour Party Autumn Conference in Brighton on Sunday evening on the Fair Admissions Campaign, titled ‘Faith & segregation: The future of religious selection at state funded faith schools’.

Speakers at the event were Chair of Accord, Rabbi Dr Jonathan Romain; Dr Mary Bousted, the General Secretary of the Association of Teachers and Lecturers; The Rev Stephen Terry, a former Chair of Governors at a state funded faith school and Rector of the Parish of Aldrington in Hove; and Barry Sheerman MP, who served as Chair of the House of Commons Education Select Committee from 2001 to 2010 and is a Lay Canon at Wakefield Cathedral. The meeting was chaired by Labour Teachers Co-editor John Taylor.

Rabbi Romain called for greater fairness in the admission policies to state funded faith schools. He noted that faith schools are the only part of the public sector allowed to choose who they served on religious grounds and argued that such selection would be unthinkable in other areas, such as in the provision of health care or regarding those who could be enrolled into different branches of the military, yet is permitted in schools, the civic institutions best placed to promote inclusive values in society.

Rabbi Romain observed that state funded faith schools are able to select pupils on faith grounds because they are exempt from the Equality Act, which he argued showed that such practices depart from society’s normal standards. He called on the Labour Party to commit in its manifesto for the next General Election to end faith discrimination in pupil admissions.

The Reverend Stephen Terry argued that society often incorrectly assumed that those with strong beliefs wanted to separate themselves from those that did not share them. However he believed the claim made by the Church of England’s Board of Education that its schools were for the whole community is sometimes different in reality and highlighted socio-economic segregation as a particular problem for Church schools.

He stated that wealthier parents are better positioned to use the education system to the advantage of their children and called upon Church schools to keep their ethos, but to adopt the same admission arrangements as community schools. He believed this would free Church schools from appearing elitist and socially divisive and would turn Anglican schools full circle, so that they return to their original mission of providing education for all those in need of it.

Dr Mary Bousted maintained that the practice of state funded schools in England and Wales selecting by faith was an international outlier. She cited a report from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development that shows that England is one of only four out of thirty two OECD member countries assessed which allowed schools to operate in this way.

Barry Sherman MP spoke about his experience of witnessing state funded schools being required to follow the School Admissions Code and of former admission practices that had led to greater covert social selection taking place at faith schools. On top of facing challenges over admissions, Mr Sheerman also argued that the faith school sector needs take more seriously issues of equality of opportunity for people on the grounds of gender and sexual diversity.

A Party member from Bristol asked the panel how they should respond to people who say they have a right to send their children to a faith school. Rabbi Romain said European and Human Rights law did not require the state to provide parents with state funded faith schooling for their children and that pupils attending a community school can learn about religious and cultural beliefs in the home and places of worship.

Ann Cryer, who served as MP for Keighley between 1997 and 2010, told the panel she was disappointed that none of them spoke about lessons from single faith schooling in Northern Ireland. Dr Bousted said there were parallels between the ethnic and religious segregation between schools in Northern Ireland and places in northern England that suffered from race riots in 2001, such as Oldham. Dr Bousted called upon schools to ensure they guaranteed pupils with an education that taught about the beliefs of people different to both themselves and the school.

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